Professor Snyder was born and raised in Painesville, Ohio, a town located 35 miles south of Cleveland. After graduating from high school, she attended nearby Lakeland Community College where her first interest was in bio-chemistry. "I originally wanted to be a pharmacy researcher and discover new drugs," Snyder said.

After two years, she left the Midwest for Athens, Ga. with her husband (who at the time was in the Navy) where she attended the University of Georgia. When her husband was transferred to Charleston, she attended the College of Charleston. It was here that she took her first class in economics and she absolutely fell in love with it. "I realized that economics was everything I wanted," Snyder said adding, "I didn't want to be a researcher stuck in a lab all night."

While attending the College of Charleston, she worked for the BP Oil Company as the district manager's assistant. She managed the budgets and did dealer contracts. In 1993, Snyder graduated from C of C with a degree in Economics.

Upon graduation, she and her husband moved to London, England. There she attended the University of College London where she received a master's degree. While in school, she also worked for the British facilities of the City Colleges of Chicago and Troy State University. She also did some tutoring on the side.

Although Snyder liked London, she was surprised that it was somewhat of a culture shock. She also said that London was a very expensive city to reside in. "London is very formal, cosmopolitan, and staid," Snyder says, "It's almost like they still live in the 1950s."

When her husband retired from the Navy in 1997, they both moved back to Charleston. Upon her return, C of C hired her as the program director for the Tate Center for Entrepreneurship where she managed the South Carolina Economic Developer's School as well as other programs. In 1998 Snyder began teaching economics courses as an adjunct. In 1999 she was appointed a senior instructor. Snyder also teaches course in macroeconomics and microeconomics. "My favorite is macroeconomics, especially the Federal Reserve," Snyder says.

Currently, Snyder is researching productivity issues arising from healthcare policy and a paper on deep learning strategies using economic experiments in the classroom. She is also working with a colleague in Washington D.C., on the Chronic Care Project. This project involves researching how healthcare is delivered in the U.S. and is trying to develop a concept that would work on disease treatments. The disease treatments they research will mainly deal with issues of poverty and minorities.

On top of her already busy schedule, Snyder will be traveling to Brazil in December 2005 to develop an exchange/study abroad course in environmental economics and sustainable development in the Amazon. She hopes to add environmental economics as a course in 2007. This course will explain how the economy should manage scarce resources as well as determine whether production is sustainable or not. It will also determine what types of policies should or should not be used.

Snyder is a very outgoing and positive. She is passionate about her work and her students. There is also something else that she is very passionate about and that is baseball. Her number one favorite team is none other than the C of C Cougars. She's a season tickets holder and rarely misses a game. "The Cougars are my favorite team," she says. "I don't have a favorite player, I love them all."

Professor Snyder is very well-rounded and is so passionate about her occupation, her students, and baseball. Her determination and dogged efforts makes her more notable and admirable. According to Snyder she sums herself up in these words: "A student advocate."

###